Putin is angry: Soldiers from Russia have probably lost a holy relic

Soldiers lose relic

Now the Kremlin’s anger is directed against the church

Russian soldiers are said to have lost the remains of a saint while retreating from a position in Ukraine. The Kremlin is angry and demands a report.

In the east of the Ukraine Russian soldiers are said to have lost parts of the relic of St. Dmitri Donskoy. This is reported by several military bloggers on Telegram, including the usually well-informed channel “Kremlyovskaya Tabakerka”. According to him, the remains of the medieval prince Dmitry Donskoy were lost when soldiers had to flee from Ukrainian fire during a prayer service.

“We led several reliquaries containing the remains of St. Prince Dmitry through the special military operation zone,” the blogger quotes an anonymous priest who is said to have been at the scene. “In one sector of the front, the place of the prayer service where officers had gathered was shelled. The military had to withdraw and unfortunately they lost the relics. Now the enemy is at this point.”

The channel’s interlocutor then interprets the incident in a positive way: the holy prince protected the soldiers and almost no one died during the retreat. “But the loss is still enormous. Well, that’s war.”

A second Kremlin-affiliated Telegram channel, “Alex Parker,” had previously reported that Russian forces may have lost the relics during a retreat in the Donetsk region. Both depictions refer to the area around the town of Lyman. Neither has been officially confirmed by Russia.

The Russian Orthodox Church rejected the military bloggers’ reports. “The story is made up,” Vakhtang Kipshidze, deputy head of the synodal department for church relations with society and the media, told the state news agency RIA Novosti. “This is an invention, and it can be assumed that it is being spread with anti-church intentions.”

The Kremlin does not believe the church’s denial, reports Kremlyovskaya Tabakerka. There is talk of a “small conspiracy” with which the church is trying to “hide the ineffectiveness of its own actions.” The church promised that sending the relics could lead to a change at the front. “They want to deceive all of us, apparently including Vladimir Vladimirovich himself,” the report says. Vladimir Vladimirovich is the Russian president Vladimir Putin meant.

The military blogger also reports that after the relic was lost, the Kremlin demanded a full report from the church on what was happening with the relics at the front: how many prayer services were held, in which locations and whether any effect was noted.